


Between the Full Moon and a Baby's Kick or 5 Times John Winchester Fell a Little Bit Pregnant

by Severusslave



Category: Supernatural
Genre: 101 ways of becoming pregnant, 5 Things, AU, Angst, Demons, Divinity, Gen, Halloween, M/M, Monsters, Mpreg, Mystery, Papa Winchester, See John Winchester stare at the blue plus on his hCG test stick, Suspense, Witches, aaw, happy endings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-08
Updated: 2012-09-08
Packaged: 2017-11-13 19:52:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/507118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Severusslave/pseuds/Severusslave
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five very different ways that John Winchester could have had the misfortune of getting himself in a certain peculiar condition.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Between the Full Moon and a Baby's Kick or 5 Times John Winchester Fell a Little Bit Pregnant

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the 2008 Halloween Challenge at mpregwinchester on LJ.

**BLACK CATS AND HAUNTED HOUSES**

He had been hunting. A haunted house, old gnarly wood and broken window glass, at the edge of Washburn, North Dakota. About two miles away from the river, but because of the rails and the flat land, still near enough to smell it. Near enough for him to shiver because of the damp, cold air.

It had been freezing cold that night and he'd been alone. If the house had not existed, he would have been tucked in bed under all the covers he could have found. But it did, so he had been out there that night and had entered it.

An old woman had lived and had died in the house. Her and, from the smell and the general condition of every piece of rotten, scratched furniture, about a thousand cats.

John remembered that suddenly he had been rather gratefully of the head cold that had ambushed him the day before and that had restricted his sense of smell. Additionally, he had re-wrapped his scarf around his neck and lower face. 

He clearly remembered going to the dusty living room, expelling the old woman's ghost out of the house, gathering her bones, salt and burning then in the bathtub on the second floor and then a loud creak of the floorboards behind him. Then nothing.

The next thing John could recall was waking up in a bed.

Naked, scratched up, with a bite mark on his inner thigh that was already turning purple. There had been spunk on his belly, sticking his hair to his skin. His lips had felt gnawed on. 

However, the worst thing had been that he could define exactly just like what his ass had hurt like. It had hurt like it had on the weekend of his seventeenth birthday. A weekend John had spent with a nice guy named Jerry.

An experience he had thought he would never undergo again, for the next month he had met his future wife and had fallen head over heels in love with her.

John had then searched the room he'd regained consciousness in. Nice bedroom, white walls and yellow drapes and it had been obviously cared for if not expensively nor decadently decorated. His shotgun and his knives had lain on the wooden dresser. Still, no sign whatsoever of the necessary other person. Of his attacker. At least his clothes, minus one sock and his grey scarf, had been in the room. So, John had dressed himself and had exited the house he had woken up in.

Once outside, he had turned around, the pleasantly bright noon sunlight warm on his back, to look at the house and its image had seemed to shiver, shake and blur and then once again John had seen nothing but the old, rickety haunted house he'd staked out and researched the previous few days and nights.

John had stared at it, almost long enough for him to be able to draw it later if he was so inclined, observing every detail of it. The pale lilac paint on the wooden walls that had been cracked and peeling off the walls, the smashed pottery that once upon a time could have held plants in it, the trash in front of the porch, bottles, plastic cups, cigarette butts. Teenagers had partied on the property. Some hadn't survived it, they'd been the reason John had been there at all. When John had finished looking at the house he had walked to his car, had driven himself to his motel room and had disinfected and bandaged his wounds.

That evening it had rained for about half an hour. John had driven up to the house an hour after the rain shower had ended and had set the whole place on fire. He had leant against the side of his truck, arms crossed over his chest and had watched as it had burned.

A lot of black and dark grey cats had exited the haunted house, fleeing from the fire. Some had raced down the path that led to the street, either knowing their way home to their owners or taking the fastest way to get out of dodge. The vast majority, however, had vanished into thin air and disintegrated as soon as they'd streaked out of the house and hit the salt and birch line John had laid around the house.

He had used liberal amounts of fire accelerator and so it had not taken relatively long for the smoldering remains of the second floor to crush down onto the rest of the house.

The last thing John had seen there before he'd packed up and had driven away from Washburn, had been a very big, translucent black panther transforming, its flickering image shivering, blurring back into that of a human. 

John had recognized the man's face, even as the figure had screamed and the grimaces of pain had twisted the wrinkles into something almost inhuman; the husband of the old, haunting woman.

+++

He was laying low in Peru, Indiana, searching for unusual patterns of crime, mothers burnt in their nurseries as well as your common poltergeist, possession, or even demon activity, when his hostess had gotten him a doctor.

John had resisted her urging for up to two weeks now and yesterday her patience with him had apparently run down. If she hadn't looked like his own grandmother, he was sure he would have resisted her for much longer.

The doc she had got him was a daughter of hers, a heavy-set woman in her forties, one of those no nonsense women that John actually felt comfortable to be around.

His regular puking fests had already been related to her, but when she heard from him of his dizzy spells, the loss of appetite on some days versus the insane hunger he experienced on the others, plus his weight gain, the doc had smiled benignly and told him jestingly that "the pregnant man should take up jogging and spend some time in bed to let the cold spike and subside again, instead of delaying the inevitable."

She'd prescribed him vitamins and pedialyte and then had told her mother to brew him lots and lots of tea. John had just sat there frozen and had stared into space, then had let the two women coax him back to bed.

Yesterday had been a Sunday, thus the pharmacies had not be open.

Early this Monday morning, half convinced that he was crazy, half dreading that he wasn't, he'd gone to the nearest pharmacy, bought the pedialyte and the same brand of pregnancy tests that he'd gotten twice before for Mary. Clearly they worked.

Now, back at the Bed and Breakfast and out of his hostess' gaze, in his tiny bathroom, he sat on the bathtub's rim, looked at the flowery tiles over the toilet and did his very best to ignore the little white plastic stick on the counter for another three minutes.

There was a cozy over the excess toilet paper rolls.

The flush's string was weighted down at its end with a mother-of-pearl seahorse.

The first-aid cabinet on the wall was made out of brass and the cross on it was carefully painted on in light pink enamel.

Of course, there was a fucking blue plus sign on the test.

+++

The rest of the day he spent in bed. He got hot fruit tea in such close intervals, it would have been easier if Madam Hollis just hooked him up on a tea IV. But he did not complain about it as her eclairs and madeleines that came with the dreaded tea were heavenly.

He lay on his back, propped up on huge pillows with his hands and arms strictly kept next to him. Now that he knew that the little beer gut was in fact not one of those it felt more heavy then ever. He could not touch it. Touching it now would make it real. More so then the little test stick in the trash.

He feverishly thought back and tried to explain just how the hell this could've happened to him. It took him several hours - and frighteningly obscure thoughts about his own genetics and that of his parents - to remember the blasted haunted house in North Dakota. 

That had been in November. Mid-November, he thought. Now it was the end of March. 

It fit. 

Dean and Sam both had begun kicking Mary right in the middle of her pregnancies. He had a couple of weeks yet until he could expect to feel that. That would put the time the baby would want to be born… John counted the months on his fingers hidden under the comforter. August. The beginning of August.

Well, at least his kids' birthdays were nicely spread across the year, he thought and was struck by the insanity of it all.

Oh god, was he really doing it? Seeing this through?

What if the thing inside of him was not completely human. Or at all? John frowned. 

The huge black cat spirit that he thought responsible for all this, had been human again in the end. Still, it could…

He needed help. And somebody who knew to operate an ultrasound machine.

At that thought a sudden memory came to the surface of his mind. John felt his face slowly twisting into a smirk. There was someone.

Ha!

Singer would keel over and die! It would serve the old bastard right.

John let out a low cackle and unconsciously rubbed his belly.

**WITCHES AND KNIGHTS**

It had been just the second time that John had met a coven of witches. He was still new to the hunting business, he knew that. Everybody and everything, every failure and, yes, even every success told him that. The guys and the women he'd met that hunted the evil in the world as well all were veterans. Bloodied soldiers and strong warriors. He felt like being a Private again.

The war he now fought in was infinitely more dangerous.

He had followed rumors to the coven. Rumors of horrid revenge on men, of a punishment for those who are unfaithful. It was definitely unnatural. Definitely supernatural.

Three men had committed suicide inside a month in the cozy, little town of Bee Branch, Arkansas. The rumors spoke of things growing inside of them, driving them mad and making them kill themselves in a fit of insanity.

The rumors had been right. Only, instead of the demonic spawn that John had thought of, in the coroners reports, sealed and hidden as they had been, it was written, black on white, that there had been fully formed female reproductive organs inside each of the men and that all three had been pregnant at their time of deaths.

John had spent more time then he had planned to in the coroner's office late at night as he had stared at the reports and had not wanted to believe his eyes. Poor, poor bastards.

That night he had first thought of witches as a cause and promptly had set out to find connections between the dead men that could lead him to a coven. Even though two of his initial theories had been dead-ends, John had not needed a lot of time, three days only, to find the women responsible and confirm his deduction.

There had been three witches, women who owned a large green house together and were fairly successful in their business, but apparently not so with the men in their lives. They'd somehow gotten their hands on a legit spell book and for once, as John would learn in coming years, it was a book of white magic.

This all was knowledge he had not possessed as he had broken into their shared house and had attempted to burn the book and the small altar. He'd been caught. And as the witches had seen that he was here to destroy them - all the rage, loss, frustration and thirst for revenge in his eyes; still fresh three years after the destruction of his life - they had defended themselves and had cursed him. 

As he later would learn, they had used the curse they had known best and when John had heard that he'd instantly known of his fate. They had counted on the force of the curse to knock him out as it worked its magic on his body, altering it, as it had done with their other marks. It had worked out.

But something had been different, they'd told him, instead of incapacitating him because of pain, he'd been hovering above their floor, glowing gently as he had been covered in white light and he had been asleep. So they had watched him. To see what had happened. Instead of dumping his unconscious body somewhere to be found as they had with the other men.

When he had woken up, hours later, he'd dropped down a few feet onto a bare mattress that had been pushed underneath him. He'd been shackled. His weapons had been taken from him.

They'd interrogated each other. Threatened and baited. 

The three witches - Mellanie, whose husband had cheated on her with her sister; Jordan, whose boyfriend who had cheated on her with three other married women; and Holly, whose husband had cheated on her with his best man - had learned that their belief in fidelity and the idea of marriage was not a foolish woman's dream, but reality, as they'd learned of John's Mary and their children and had got to know the fact that John never had another woman before his wife nor after her death.

John Winchester had learned that not everything supernatural was necessarily evil in nature, that white magic and witchcraft existed and that, maybe, he was blinded by his need for revenge. He'd also learned of the exact properties and consequences of the white spell that had been cast upon him.

A witch could offer a sacrifice of her fertility, one monthly chance of a child, to give another the gift of their own offspring. It was a legit and successful spell. A prayer to the goddess of fertility and a benevolent one at that.

It was clean magic. Untainted. Pure.

The three men's death had been influenced by the spell and the pregnancies caused by it, certainly, but their deaths had been true, unmanipulated suicides. The cheating men had been panicked and had freaked and took their lives and that of their unborn children rather then see it through and face reality. 

All three witches had been horrified when they got to know of their exes' fates. 

The spell chose as the other parent of the child the person the mother-, or father-to-be, last had unprotected sexual relations with. This meant that the killed children of the witches' exes could as well have been theirs. 

This meant that John's newly formed child growing inside of him was part of his beloved Mary. 

Well, had been told to him, only if he had no other sexual partner during his pregnancy. John had scoffed. A condition very unlikely to eventuate in his case. He had felt an immeasurable need then to touch his stomach, to see for himself, to be sure that there was yet another part of his wife alive in this world.

The three women had given him a place to sleep for the night and a place to read through the old book they'd found the spell in. They had shared a lot of their knowledge about white magic with John as well, told him of their work for the environment in their region and of their attempts to help it in parts of the world farther away. They were not a very powerful coven, usually. But once, they had managed to transform heat into rain over a drought zone for half an hour. Their powers were focused on fertility, the witches told John recapitulatory, focused on nature and growth and usually on plants - that's why they had chosen that particular spell as a kind of revenge at all. 

They were good witches, they'd just been pissed off. 

John had spent the night. Awake. Reading the book. Had read about the spell and its power. He could - John had needed a lot of moments that night to swallow this - he would be able to give birth to this baby, his body would change accordingly and afterwards change back.

John had thought about it, grimly, had realistically pondered on his options. But it had not taken him long to accept, to choose the possibility over the threat of involving anyone else; distrustful, unknown medical staff to cut it out of him when the time came. Mary had suffered through two births, he could, no, he would handle one.

+++

They had exchanged names and phone numbers before he had left. Then John had driven straight home to his boys. He felt bad having left Dean alone with Sammy for two days and a night, when he had been so close. His brave boy was only seven.

But when he had come back to the motel room, even though he's loudly announced himself, his boy had a gun trained on his form until he stepped over the line of salt and out of the chalked trap. Good boy, brave boy. He had said hey to Dean and had tousled his hair and little Sammy had come out from behind the divider to the kitchen and had greeted him with a cautious, "Christo. Hey, Dad."

He remembered the conversation almost verbatim even now. He had felt so good that evening, so proud at his little sons, so grateful that he had them and so damn happy about the new one, the littlest one that would join them.

He remembered Dean's gleeful tone of voice as he asked him if he'd slayed the witches, definite sign of brotherly banter having been had while he was gone. He also could clearly see little Sammy's triumphant glow as he had said that, no, he had not. And had told them that they were good witches and that they were innocent. That they had thanked him, in fact and had shared their knowledge with him, so he was a better hunter now then before.

Dean had stopped pouting then and had nodded, apparently satisfied with this alternative. Then Sammy had asked if he was a knight then now finally. 

Sammy and Dean, too, really but never openly, had a thing for knights, dragon slayers, kings and kingdoms. John knew that it was his own fault, he had read the medieval themed children's books to Dean as a toddler and they were the only stories that Dean knew by heart and the only world that his eldest knew enough about to spin new bedtime stories for his brother when their dad was doing knightly things.

It was a welcome censorship to John. He could teach his children about the world that was far more dark and evil then he'd ever would have thought before his wife's untimely death, but still keep them somewhat innocent. Sammy wasn't quite four years old yet. He and his brother needn't know that their father, their knight, sometimes had to slay humans as well as monsters.

They were his little princes after all, or squires, or ninjas, or magic apprentices. It depended on the weekday.

Then, John had shook his head at his sons and had said, "No, your dad is still a measly hunter, not a knight yet, sadly. How could I be, after all, I spared the witches a fiery death."

"But you said they were good witches, Dad!" Sam had protested immediately. And John remembered smiling at his son, snatching him and putting him over his shoulder to carry him to the king size bed they all shared. Sam had bounced off the mattress with a gleeful squeak and Dean had rushed over too. 

John had sat down on the bed, had pulled off his jacket and had gotten out of his shoes, then laid next to Sam and Dean on his right side, dwarfing both of them next to him.

"Yes, they were good folks. I even got a gift," he'd said, beginning making up his tale.

"A gift?" Dean had asked.

"That's right, son, a gift. See, I told them about my two very good sons and about your mother and how alone you two can be when I go off to do-" "Knight quests!" "That's right, Sammy. Quests. And about how we strife about the wide lands of America like nomads. So the three good women offered to share their knowledge if I promised to take good care of my lonely boys. I agreed."

"You did?" Dean had said, in a unbelieving, low voice that had broken his heart; and had cemented his plans.

"I did. So I have new knowledge for my knightly quests and the witches put a spell on me that makes me… What do you both think did they make me?"

"Rich!" Dean had said. "Stronger!" had come from Sammy. He'd shaken his head. 

"Invincible then," Dean again. "A Lord?" Sam had asked. That had gotten both boys on a roll, wild ideas got shouted at him in the high clear voices of his sons.

"A wizard!", "A baron!", "A prince!", "A king!", "A queen!". That had made Dean crack up and laugh at his little brother.

John had seized the opportunity, though, had poked his son to make him stop laughing and had said, "Don't laugh at your brother, Dean, especially not when he's right."

Dean's eyes had got really really wide and both his boys' mouths had been wide open with surprise. "You are a queen? Dad?"

John had chortled at that and had said, "Well, not quite. The witches want me to protect you and give you a really good childhood, so you can grow up to be good men and maybe become-" "Knights!" Sammy had interrupted. "Yes, knights. Or mechanics, or firemen, or teachers, or scientist, or just really good big boys. Whatever you want."

Dean had then pushed his little hand in John's belly and had declared his wish to become a hunter, just like him. John would always remember the sick feeling in his gut as his seven years old son stated his intention with such a mature tone and had promptly made a promise to Mary up in heaven that he would keep on this new course to the future for their kids' sake.

"Okay, son, if that's what you want," John had answered. 

"I do, dad. To keep Sammy save," his darling boy, his brave boy, his little soldier had said then and John had wanted to cry.

He had blinked the risen tears away, roughly but carefully grabbed both his sons' heads and kissed them on top of their hair, each after the other.

He'd cleared his throat, "Want me to finish my story, boys? Yes, good. Here we go, so, the witches know of our family, of your mom and that we're quite alone without her. And they made me promise to protect you. Thus, they made me like a king, to raise you in a kingdom that's filled with everything you could ever want. But also, they made me like a queen, because your mother is in heaven and cannot be with us here on Earth anymore and to make me able to receive their best gift."

"What's the gift, daddy?" Sammy had whispered, humbled by the promises and by his emotional story.

"A baby."

"A baby? Daddy!" Sammy had said alarmed, "Daddy, why is it not here then? Daddy!" Sammy had gasped then and John would have never guessed what he'd been about to ask, "Daddy, is it still in the car?"

He'd laughed then, had burst out loud, deep guffaws that had shaken the bed and had made his kids bounce as Dean bobbed Sammy in the head and told him off.

He had laughed until tears ran down his face and had succumbed to a few fits of giggles at his sons' weird facial expressions. 

"Oh, man. Um, no, Sammy. It's not in the car," he had taken his son's hand in his and put it against his belly, underneath the flannel shirt. "It's in there."

Dean had got it directly and had stared at him like he was insane. Sammy had been confused and yes, they had not been around many pregnant women lately, hadn't they? Then his face had crumpled a bit and he had stopped his searching pressing on John and Dean had immediately reacted, "Dude, Dad did not eat it!"

That had resulted into a impromptu sex ed lesson, age eight and under appropriate, natural and supernatural versions. Man plus woman equals baby in mommy and man plus woman plus magic equals baby in daddy.

Sammy had been cool with it once he had understood the gist of it. Dean had been reserved. Has asked questions about John's stance to the baby and what it would mean for them rather then ask about the whole sex ed thing.

"What are we going to do then, sir?" he'd asked finally.

John had fished for the map in the pocket of his coat next to the bed, had folded it and, after having swept the pillows off the bed, had spread it there. 

"We are buying a house. If I am to be king and queen to this family I need a kingdom to live in with my princes, don't I?"

Sammy had cheered and had thrown himself onto the map, pretending to read the names on it, in search for someplace nice and warm with other kids, too. Dean had looked at him with his big, green eyes full of gratitude and John had regrets choking him even when Dean had joined Sam half on the map too, reading state names for real.

+++

Now was two years later from the evening in the motel's room that had been the beginning of change. Dean was nine years and eleven months!, Sammy was five and already in school and their little sister Alice was a year old.

They were all living in a middle-sized, pale yellow bungalow house that had come with a large garden, (A kingdom, Daddy!), in a suburb of Greensboro, North Carolina. He had a job as a car mechanic in a garage just one block down the street and he was able to take the baby with him to work. The girls at the garage adored all his kids. Each week day after lessons Dean would fetch his brother from the grade school next to his junior high and they'd walk over to the garage. First came homework, then Dean joined him to learn about cars and Sam played with his sister, read stories to her, taught her things, watched over her as she wobbly toddled over to whatever or whoever was most fascinating at the moment.

It was a good life. 

Their sister's arrival into their lives, his bleak one, his sons' tragic one, had lightened up all their spirits. She truly was a gift. 

A few months before, a woman, her name was Ellen Harvelle, had took him aside as he'd accompanied his favorite friend and hunter Bobby Singer to a hot spot of the community, a road house and had given him stern talking-to.

Now, he did no longer go off on his own ever, participated more in the gathering and distributing of knowledge then the actual hunting and had procured a very good life insurance on himself so that his children would be well off whatever might happen. The kids next of kin emergency contacts, aside of him, all consisted of his fellow men and women. People he knew would care for the children, would raise them if necessary.

The gathering and distributing of knowledge brought lots of business to the garage and thus he got good raises on occasion, because hunters, the very people who needed to be able to rely on their vehicles, knew him or of him and chose to have their cars cared for or tuned up in a garage that would not call the feds on them because of the occult paraphernalia and the weapon arsenals in their cars. 

Plus, even though he was no longer on the roads chasing after the yellow eyed demon that killed his Mary, he was closer to the bastard then ever before. His name was Azazel.

He was a powerful son of a bitch, but John had friends now.

It was a good life.

**PUNCH AND COSTUMES**

One Halloween, when Dean had been eight and Sammy was old enough to sleep through the night if his brother was next to him, John Winchester got out and into town.

He was not one for parties, never had been, but tonight being around two little kids had been finally too much. He paid the fee for one of the bigger bars that had a costume thing going on. He had chosen to wear one of his thicker flannel shirts and had his axe with him as a costume prop. He was allowed to enter. 

With his axe.

He'd have to keep an eye on the bouncers and who the hell they let enter if they let him keep his weapon just like that.

He strolled around the entirety of the bar and around the lowered dance floor, part admiring the costumes, part looking for troublemakers, before he took a seat on a deserted stool at the bar, ordering a beer.

He got it, a moment later, plus a see-through plastic cup filled with punch. There was a blackish wine gum spider swimming in it. For the last weeks Dean had eaten those like they were the last food on earth available.

He grinned at the thought and fished the spider out of his punch. He slurped the slick candy from his fingers, looked up and got hit on by Batman.

+++

As John woke up the next morning he had a construction crew in his head jackhammering away like there was no tomorrow. John groaned. He carefully turned over onto his stomach and cuddled up to Batman. He yawned.

Wait a minute!

John lifted his head, stupid move, urgh and looked around. He was in a large room; there were bare, painted concrete walls and neon lights on the ceiling. A large mattress lay wedged into a corner, but still took up most of the room's floor space, leaving an L of walking space.

There were four other half naked bodies sleeping on it besides himself. The guy dressed up as Batman and three women, one still wearing a latex nurse dress.

Well, hell. 

John sat up. There were several condoms littering the floor around the huge mattress. At least that was a relief. John extracted himself from the clingy guy and stood up. Trying to reduce the steps needed to gather up his pants and boots, he went off the mattress and out of the room.

He got greeted by a woman behind the bar with the ominous words, "Another one," as he walked towards the exit of the bar. "How many others are still in The Room?" is what she wanted to know. He heard the capital letters.

"Four," he said. 

Her mumbled answer did not reassure him at all, "Oh, so a few musta left when I was schleppin' out the trash."

He left. As fast as he could.

When he crashed on his bed in their motel room half an hour later, he had no more energy to correct Dean's hushing to Sammy, telling him that Dad was tired because of a hunt for the monsters.

+++

Twelve years later and Dean and Sam's brother Dominic still did not know who his father was. At least the other one. And he would never know, if John had any say in it.

He did. So no second dad for Dominic.

It wasn't that John did not want anyone else to help raise his kid, or that he was exceptionally possessive or something. He could be, about others, strangers that wanted things of his kids, but not about the mother… or father of his children.

It was just that, well, he did not know the guy's name. Maybe he had, once, but the alcohol surely did erase any knowledge of it.

And they all, but especially Dean, would never let him live it down if he said that Nicky's father was the Batman.  


**PUMPKIN PIE, PSYCHICS AND DIVINE FAITH**

When the he-nurse read off the information and told him the news, stumbling over his name and the fact that, hey, he wasn't a woman, that, well, apparently, his wife and not him was pregnant, all John felt like was suckerpunching the twink and looting his medical sheet off of the unconscious man-boy.

He didn't, of course and instead semi-politely asked for it and in the next possible moment quickly left the clinic with the papers.

He drove out of town for twenty minutes, then parked the car.

It was his name, his alias anyway, J. O'Darry, on a pink sheet that was probably – hopefully – usually used for women. Of course, the initial J. could've been of a female name. 

There. Right there.

There was a little, scrawled cross in the field next to the damning YES to the question PREGNANT?

And underneath it, there was the scientific proof documented. Positive for hCG. Which meant that he was pregnant, alright and that he had a placenta somewhere inside of him, in either an uterus or something alike it, that was sustaining a fetus, thus giving of hCG.

Holy hell.

Holy hell. It was worth repeating.

"Holy hell," worth vocalizing.

Holy fucking hell.

John did not know what to think, did not want to even, but his brain did the deed for him anyway. How did that happen? How could it have happened? Who was the father? Mother? Was it his? Holy hell, was it even his own? Wait, was it human? Does he have a demon incubating inside of him? Demonic spawn?

He needed clarity. And for that he needed help. He drove home.

+++

Home was a little bungalow in a nice suburb of Oklahoma City right now, as he had promised Sam that he could finish high school in one place, at one school.

He had gone into their kitchen and had put a frozen microwave lasagna dinner in the microwave, had stared at it rotating for eight minutes, then had sat himself down on the couch, the TV program magazine protecting his thighs from the hot dish.

He ate.

Dean came home from a hunt he'd been on up north with Caleb as John fished for the last bit of noodle with his fork, smelling of sweat, mud and mildly sulfur. He wore a satisfied smirk on his face. One less monster in the world scaring little kids.

Still, Caleb as backup partner or not, he'd have to talk to Dean about confronting demons without him.

Dean hit the shower, John took his clothes and threw them in front of the washer to be sorted later. Then put a second serving of lasagna into the microwave for his son. He wiggled a beer out of its plastic six-pack package, then froze and stood in front of the open fridge, put it back again and helped himself to the tetra pack of multivitamins juice Sam liked.

Back to the couch. Sam came home, from the sound of it having gotten a ride from his study buddy Gabrielle. Study buddy, John'd had them, too, back then, but with Sam there was actual studying going on. He had weird kids.

Sam was joining Dean in the bathroom after throwing a hey at John and… brushed his teeth? Yeah, those were tooth brushing noises. Weird kids, for sure.

Dean shut off the shower and moments later there were his two kids sitting on either side of him. Dean swiped the TV program from underneath his ass and began to devour lasagna that was still lava-like hot and steaming. Sam was throwing John evil glances as he drank his juice, but then again Sam had John's beer in his hand.

Sam retold Dean's hunt for him, apparently the topic had already been dealt with in the bathroom, then told them about this project he got burdened with at school.

It was always school stuff with Sam; when Dean had been Sammy's age there had been girl stories. Ah well, he was too young to be a granddad at his age.

Then Sam said something that could possibly solve several problems and worries for John. 

Sam had to do a report on a U.S. state and had to take Missouri. After that John did not listen to him anymore as a proverbial light bulb got switched on above his head.

Missouri. She could, she had to be able to tell him how and why and what.

John looked out the window, night. He looked at the clock, just ten past seven. Damn October. Alright, he would take the drive up north tomorrow then.

Right now he had to find a bearable alternative to 'Child's Play 2', Dean's choice and 'Cruel Intentions', Sam's.

+++

The trip up north on the I-35 took him a bit over four hours. He parked the car in front of Missouri's house at noon.

Before he could knock on the door, it was opened and he was ushered into the home with the words, "Sit down at the table. I made pot roast fawn roulades with dumplings."

His favorite. Eerie.

"Of course," said Missouri as she bustled at the stove, switching it off, taking with her a huge ceramic bowl full of dumplings, "I know your favorite food, John Winchester."

He lowered his head, abashed that he doubted her powers.

"Stop that nonsense and feed your little boy some excellent Moseley dumplings. Made them from scratch, like my mama taught me to."

John froze. He felt his heart speed up and beat at a mad pace.

Missouri smiled a fond, gentle smile, "It's yours. He's human. Completely. You are in your fifth month. Now, John," she addressed him in a low voice, "count back."

He did. As Missouri filled up her and his plates with food, he counted back. 

Five months. October; ten. Minus five. May.

In May he had been… home mostly. And in Springfield, Illinois.

"Bingo," Missouri said.

"But I did not have any sex there at all!" He had saved a small family in Springfield. 

A pair of sisters and their children, all of them kindergarten age. They'd moved in together because both their husbands had been abusive assholes. He'd cleaned up the spooking poltergeist in their cellar and got to beat the lights out of two cowardly, child-beating bastards who really seemed to want just that as they had crept about the house looking for trouble. Or victims. He'd called the police on them and both husbands got what they deserved. Time in jail. Lots of it.

"Nah, but sometimes, that's not what's needed."

It was not?

Missouri quickly slapped her hand over her mouth as she laughed at his dumbfounded expression. She cleared her throat after swallowing the bite of roulade and answered John's question, "No, it's not, John. You do know of the supernatural. Not all of it is colored as dark as the things you usually deal with. There is such a thing called faith."

"Faith." John repeated and cut up his fawn roulade in bite-sized pieces.

"Faith is much more powerful then just providing you hunters with holy water and neat, short exorcism rituals, boy. You'd do better to remember that, John Winchester. After all, who of the both of us in this room does the virgin birth thing? Me? I don't think so."

His fork fell out of his slack hand and clattered on Missouri's fine china. He forgot to breathe.

What? What, what? 

He gasped out parts of sentence, "Ah, I… but. Mary and."

"You ever had a man fuck you up the ass?" the woman asked brazenly.

John choked on his own spit. He coughed into the napkin Missouri had handed him, all the while frantically shaking his head, eyes wide open.

"Well, there you go. Virgin."

"Good god, warn a guy, woman!" John said. Missouri laughed and pointed at him with her knife, "And miss that spit-take? No way."

"You're evil, girl. You do know that?"

Missouri just picked her own top in that silent I'm the pimp gesture of superiority. 

John smiled at that, then asked for explanation. "And how exactly have I …gotten pregnant via faith?"

"All of them, the two mothers whose children you have saved and the kids who have seen for the first time that men could be not hurting them and their mom's prayed for you that night. Prayed for you to have a big family of your own to love and protect."

"I have Sammy and Dean."

"I know. I don't know why the powers made you conceive a child, but probably the mother's prayers had been more detailed then their children's had been," Missouri took a sip of her white wine, John himself had water filling up his wine glass, "Maybe, thought, the powers knew that you and your sons as well probably, could handle such a mightful child."

"Mightful?" he asked.

Missouri snorted, "You think a child conceived via faith and prayer, without sex, without any merging of seed and egg, that grows inside of a man to be born to him is not going to be powerful?" Missouri ate a piece of dumpling, "Think again."

"Christ!"

Missouri made a small, hurried waving gesture, chewed, swallowed, "Oh yeah, about that. With your wife called Mary and the virgin birth deal, don't even think about naming this sweet thing Jesus. You ain't black or latino, Mr Flannel and it would be truly bad form."

John looked at her, bemused, "I wouldn't."

"Jacob sucks, too. As does Tyler …and Kiefer. Kiefer, are you kidding me?" Missouri shook her head at his thoughts. "Before you drive home, you get this nice name book I got around here somewhere and my phone number. You will better call me before you name this innocent boy after pine tree, of all things. Will you call me, John Winchester?"

She stared at him until he nodded.

"Pine tree, my bum. Your boys are lucky their mother named them, be sure to tell them that, when you tell them about this lunch date of ours."

Telling Dean and Sammy. Oh God.

"Oh, God," he breathed.

"Oh, shush, you." Missouri admonished him, "Tuck in and feed the baby while I tell you what you should do about those two."

He did and the food was heavenly. He speared up a small vinegar onion and ate it as he listened to his old friend.

"Tell them on Halloween. They'll laugh and make fun of you and this, to them, imaginary child. Then when you grow bigger and they'll see that it was no joke at all, they'll be sorry and apologetic instead of suspicious about demonic influences. Well, long enough so to give you time to properly tell them."

"On Halloween, but we're-"

"Oh, oh no, stop it right there, Mister! Your boys might want to go and hunt, fine, but you? You are staying right home. The most dangerous thing you'll do in the next months better will be driving your car and chopping up dinner food!"

He was of a mind to protest, but his friend stared him down and it was not as if he did not know that he would do everything in his might to keep this new child of his safe.

He raised his hands, palms flat to show his acquiescence. There were days that he thought his friendship with Missouri was but a long, long line-up of moments of submission to the formidable woman. Mary had been like her, strong, stubborn.

And just as good a cook. John relished in the last of the fawn gravy's taste.

Missouri barely waited for him to wipe his plate clean using a last piece of dumpling, then she swiped the plate out from his reach and replaced it with a smaller one that carried a piece of pie.

"Pumpkin pie. Eat as much as you want. There is lots more of it, I carved out three huge ones for my porch."

"You hate carving pumpkins," John reminded her.

"The kids next door wanted to. Their mom is in the hospital, dad's working and I watch them after school three days a week."

"Sucker," John teased.

"We'll talk in a few years. Any you shouldn't complain, you get the best part of that blasted vegetable. Pie."

John nodded and sunk his fork into the tip of his piece. Mmmmh.

He had two more pieces of pie that day, after Missouri, blasted woman that she was, had dragged him to go grocery shopping with her. Carrying the bags, she'd said, he should do without any complains, for had he not arrived at her door with a little extra life inside of him, he'd been exchanging her couch for a new one right now. Somehow Missouri always got him to work for her.

She had not let him leave that day, giving him one of her intensely disapproving looks as he'd mentioned it, but had made him spend the night and drive home the next day after a hearty breakfast.

+++

He had told the boys about their new brother to be on Halloween and, like he knew he would, got laughed at big. But it had all worked out fine.

After high school, Sam had planned to leave for California to go to college, go away on his own. But when he had seen his baby brother for the first time, he would tell them later, he'd revised his plans and did his best to convince his family to move there with him.

His boy was a stubborn mule and so when Sam started his first semester at Stanford he'd done so from home, driving to campus each morning by bicycle, returning from his classes in time to see either John or Dean going off to work, all of them watching over Mattie in shifts. The volatile air between him and Sam had almost completely evaporated when Sam had learned their attitude towards protecting him first hand with Matthew. College did the rest, really.

On the night that marked the beginning of Mattie's seventh month alive, Sam, Dean and John did not sleep. They held vigil around Mattie's sleeping form, armed to the teeth and still the demon came and got into their house, just to spite them.

His grown boys were pinned to the walls and John himself had the place of honor on the ceiling above Mattie, blood from two cuts on his torso dropping down onto his son. But when the yellow eyed demon bend over to pick Matthew up, Sam kind of pulsed with energy and seemed to burn up with it. 

The bastard of a demon was frozen in place and suddenly black and yellow smoke floated sluggishly out every orifice of the host. It cackled with energy and lightning and seemed to scream voicelessly but the bright energy that came from his son burned it all up. It did so slowly; like a steady stream of magma ate up whole forests, Sam destroyed the demon. 

Then it was over and the whole world seemed to fall down. John did his best to brace his fall because of the baby underneath him. He broke his left arm, landing twisted, but Mattie had not come to harm. 

Both his sons and the host's body had crumpled. The poor guy had whispered a few thanks to God then had died, blood bubbling up his throat, his lasts breaths gurgling. They had burned his body in the desert.

Sam had been freaked about the power in him and it had taken a few months for their family to completely recover from the whole ordeal, up to the point of Sam's acceptance of his abilities. They all had searched for the origin of them and finally had gotten answers out of a blind medium in Arizona. Originally demonic in origin, the powers had been cleansed by Sam's outburst to protect Matthew, the sacred child born to a man and had reversed into divine energy.

Nowadays it was not unusual to see both his younger sons play with balls of white light, throwing them to each other in a game, training their powers.

Now they made jokes about Dean and when he finally would sprout wings and never get laid again except for with nuns (Haha, not funny at all, Sam!), as it seemed to be a trend of John's children to be holy and sacred beings these days.

When, on a summer day during Sam's eighth college semester, Dean had swatted at a light ball that had ricocheted in his direction and actually batted it away, John had laughed so hard at his incredulous face.

Life had worked out fine.

**KIDS PLAYING TRICKS**

There are things and situations John Winchester had found himself in that he, with one hundred percent accuracy, can blame on his dumbass sons. Such as this:

It had been summer, yes, but the week they had spent in tiny Grass Range, Montana, had been whiny, muddy, rainy and rather cold. The monster had been killed and for once, no witnesses had been involved in the hunt to be avoided now, so they had chosen to spent a week in town. Lying low. Letting all of them recharge on energy and heal from minor scratches.

It had been because of the fact that they had already hunted down and destroyed, very efficiently too, all the demonic and ghostly activity hotspots that John had gathered information on for the summer, that he had been there in this bar with his sons. 

John had let it become a habit of his to save up on the less urgent cases for the summer holidays. Sam was still in high school and while he was fine with riding with John and Dean during the holidays, he had gotten increasingly annoying about missing school in the last years. This habit of John's had saved him a lot of verbal spars and cat-fights with his younger son.

And got him to watch truly hilarious scenes like this.

John himself had sat at a back table, a long one along the wall to the right of the bar, the perfect spot to overview the entire room, the entrance and, best of all, his two crazy sons. Who, at that moment had been play acting as a gay couple. To let Sam get a girl. Probably Dean, too, as a side effect. John had not been entirely sure about it.

His boys had done that act before, a few times in his presence, a lot more when he was not there from their tales. 

The first time he'd got to witness it, he'd freaked. Not badly, but enough to make Dean get nervous and cut the act short. Neither boys had got a date that evening. The thing had been that it was clear to John's eyes, who knew the truth about their, well, relationship to each other, that it had not been the first time that Sam had cuddled up to his brother in plain view, nor that it had been the first time that Dean had nuzzled his brother's neck making Sam wiggle on Dean's lap. That level of intimacy could not having been faked. He'd freaked, even though both his sons had warned him beforehand of what they'd do.

That evening, back in the room at the motel, non-fun conversations had been held and all parties had gone to bed feeling relieved, awkward and highly embarrassed.

Now and at that rainy summer evening in the bar in Montana, John saw only the funny side of it. Gay chicken, his sons ruled. Gay drama break-up and getting consolidation drinks from a busty female, his sons earned Olympic gold in.

So, at that evening in Montana, perfectly cool, tall beer in his hand, John had sat in his corner to the right of the bar, had been watching his boys do their thing and had chuckled at their antics. 

That night, the young thing Sam had been silently sniffing after for a few days, the dog, had turned him down. So Sam had returned to John and Dean at the back table, pouted and moped a bit until the evil glint in his eyes had reappeared and then had snatched Dean to the fairly crowded dance floor to make the girl jealous. John had come to love this particular act of theirs. Dance, grope places that made John avert his eyes, then go up to the girl in question and tell them that it had been both of them they could have had, their loss, tatah. Seeing the girls' faces was worth seeing his sons' groping.

John remembered having chuckled into his beer as he had been taking a sip and then there had been that guy in his face. Tall one, dark hair, strong, about 30 years old. John could have taken him down in a fight, if it had come to one. It hadn't, even thought in the first seconds of their acquaintance it had looked like it might have.

The guy, later John would learn that his name was Olivier which did not fit him, had rudely asked what he was doing laughing at the nice two guys dancing with each other and if he was the sort to make trouble. Then he'd launched into a short defensive speech of equality and gay rights and everybody being friendly with each other in Grass Range.

John had been bemused as he'd denied being trouble and especially for those two. Olivier had asked why that was and John had said that those guys were his boys.

At those words the bit that had relaxed in the other man's face at his denial of being trouble had snapped back up, tense and had gotten the company of a wary glance.

John remembered having thought something along the lines of Jesus fucking Christ. And having cursed his foolish sons under his breath. Then he had clarified that Sam and Dean both were his sons. Not his property, nor his whores. 

That had made the guy next to him huffy and indignant. He'd looked like he would make things difficult for his boys, so John had opened his mouth and had bullshitted his way out of a kick out of town.

He'd told the guy, that, yes, both of them were his sons and yes, they were mucking a girl about. That said girl had said hurtful things to his younger son and this was their little harmless revenge on her, but that was no reason for the guy to go over there and bust their asses, as they both really were homosexual, just not with each other and that he was really, truly proud of them both. Even though they were playing a trick on a local girl right now, the knaves!

And, yes, this class A bullshit had got John what he had wanted to achieve, the guy leaving his boys alone, but also had made the man look at him with stars in his eyes and it had got him a drink paid by a man.

That had been a new one.

What also had been a first, was the way his solitary beer at the back of a bar had turned into a date with a genuinely gay guy. For, after his soon-to-be-dead-by-his-very-hands sons had returned to the table, they'd quickly got a grasp of the situation from Olivier's enthusiastic talk and had decided that their old man could be left holding the bag on his own and had made like a tree.

They'd left after they had meaningfully and rather obviously given him one of the two motel door key cards Dean had in his wallet and they'd told him to have a nice date.

Then, he could have throttled them for that. Nowadays, he sometimes still felt like it, to be quite honest.

Well, the date with Olivier, as he soon had found out after his sons had left the guy's name was, had been pleasant. Nice conversation. Free drinks. Not bad. 

Weird, but not bad.

John remembered thinking that it was okay, relatively seen, but that he missed the possible-sex vibes he felt when on a date with a woman. Few that they had been since his wife's death.

But then, suddenly, the man had laid his hand upon John's on the table. And, woah.

Vibes. Yes.

John remembered that he had not freaked out about this revelation at all and now, having thought about it many times, he thought that this should have been his first clue about something going on. It had not been, of course, but it should have been.

So, John had not freaked out about feeling horny vibes for a guy while he was on a date in a seedy bar with him. Quite the contrary, John had quietly gone along with it and he remembered thinking about the stupid expressions on his sons' faces that would have to appear when he answered them 'Yes.' to the coming question of 'Got laid, Dad?'.

He had not once thought about it, had not once wondered about the atypical behavior he showed. No, John had finished his drink, had let his date pay and had got laid in his motel room. Spectacularly.

+++

When he had woken up the next morning, Olivier had been gone. Thank God.

He'd showered, dressed and had gone over to his boys' room. They had brought breakfast there already; muffins, sugary donuts and freshly made egg sandwiches from the tiny bakery down the road, coffee and soda.

Neither Sam nor Dean had asked the question. Neither Sam nor Dean had needed to. The purple hickey on John's neck and the one in John's elbow had told a tale of their own.

The breakfast had been had in near silence, the only thing loud in the room had been John's smirk. Real Gay Chicken score 1:0 for John, sons the losers, was what he had thought again and again throughout the whole day. It had surprised him how okay, how cool he had been with the whole thing. But he had mentally shrugged his shoulders at it and had been satisfied with the outcome.

The shock reaction and the shaking bouts caused by panicked adrenaline would not arrive until months in the future.

+++

It had been last month, in fact. When something had kicked him.

From the inside.

Which, for a hunter, or other people somehow in touch with the supernatural, is not as unusual as one might think it is. The thing was, it had not been a ripping, shredding, bowel-bursting excruciating pain. Or a ghost-like, icy cold cramping. Or a burning acid sensation that ate through you when possession meets holy water.

It had felt like a butterfly. Tickling. It had felt …good.

So he'd freaked.

Because he had thought the exact words that had been said to him by Mary. Both times when she'd been pregnant. And, holy hell, oh my God.

There were always days when he wished harder for the normal life, even being a mechanic again, being a civilian. That day, he'd wished for them, because, why the heck had he have to think about male pregnancy first when there was movement in his belly? Why did he have to be so quick to consider and reject almost all other possible reasons?

Why wasn't he amongst the ninety-nine point nine percent of men in the world anymore that could put away worried thoughts about a recently developed beer gut (despite the puking of weeks past) and some gas stomach pains on just those normal, common reasons?

Well, that had been him freaking out. He'd trashed his bedroom like a teenager as well. Sam had looked at him weirdly the next days. Dean had not been at home then, but in California somewhere.

It had taken him four days to find a ob/gyn's office that was easy to break into. Then he had read up on ultrasound. When he finally had laid himself down on the examination bed in the semi dark room and had awkwardly held that little sensor mouse thing to his body and had seen the fetus inside of him on the screen, John'd been speechless. 

He'd been prepared for anything, really. Anything bad, from a demonic deformed thing inside of him to - whatever - eggs, perhaps, tentacles, anything. What he'd failed to prepare for was the possibility that the thing that had kicked him form the inside was a normal looking, small human fetus.

John had seen both his sons on one of these monitors and this thing inside him, this baby, looked just like they had. Looked normal.

Kicked his one leg, John had been able to feel it and had rolled around a bit to the side.

It had been like a punch in the face, these seconds of falling in love with something so utterly fragile and unprotected and his.

He had spent more time then he had planned to inside that examination room, staring at the monitor. Then he had figured out how to make prints with the attached photo printer and took the proof home with him.

+++

Over the course of the next days John had called Bobby Singer, who's the one guy John knows that got the most books about the occult and the supernatural on maybe the entire Northern American continent. They had words and made up and laughed at their stupidity and it felt good to have this friend back.

Bobby had mailed him copies of a benign spell of origin spell to the boys' house. John had done the spell work the next night in Dean's room - his son had been over at a girl's house. The results that had spelled themselves out in writing using the blood John had sacrificed had told him that yes, the baby was human. So it was his and that guy Olivier's. Who could have done something to make it possible for John to get pregnant in the first place. Or, of course, it could have been something else, some other phenomenon or monster before their meeting, anything really, that had gotten John altered and ultimately into this mess. He would never know. Probably.

He had gotten rid of the spell's necessities, had burned some, had thrown some others away and then had thought about what he should do now.

Dean had found him sitting on his bed, chin cradled into his folded hands, staring at nothing. John knew that he had freaked his son out with his lurking in the dark and especially with his lurking in the dark in Dean's room. He certainly had not cared then, he did not care now as well. Back then he had his head full with bigger worries than his grown son who was healthy and alive.

John couldn't really remember the details of what he had said to Dean that night, or if there had been any significant conversation at all, whenever he remembered those days his memories jumped from sitting in the dark, thinking, to the next day's morning, which had found all three of them in the kitchen eating breakfast.

John had dropped the news on them that morning.

+++

In fact, it had been over coffee and cold cereal. For once they'd all sat around the small, round table in their kitchen and had eaten a meal together. For once Sam had not shoveled his food into himself and raced out of their three-room apartment to go wherever he liked it more. It had been a Saturday, so Dean had been in no hurry to go to his job.

When both his sons had finished cleaning off their bowls, in a fit of anxiety, John bustled the dishes out of their hands and into the sink. He had stood there, drawing in deep breaths and had listened to his sons bicker about anything and nothing at all. He'd gotten out the prints in the envelope from where he'd stashed them and had let fall in the middle of the table as he sat down again.

"Oh!" Dean had said, "New case?" He'd grabbed for the envelope and had shaken out the prints. "Huh? What are those?"

Dean had shown the ultrasound prints to Sam then and Sam had recognized them for what they were. "This is a baby. These are print-outs from an ultrasound examination."

Dean had yanked the prints back to him, "This is a baby? You sure, Sammy? This looks more like snow war on TV, with the black guys winning." Dean had tilted his head to look at the prints again.

"Dumbass, yes, this is a baby. An about, hmm, six months old fetus, I'd say. And a boy," Sam had stated. John was sure that he had worn the same incredulous face as Dean had. Just where did the boy learn all that? Certainly not in school. Did they teach such things? And how did he remember all those facts, right along all the lore and languages needed for hunting?

Dean had poked Sam and asked, "Alright, Doc. Just how do you know this?"

Sam had smirked at Dean and had met John's eyes to let John partake in his mirth, a rare thing back then between them, "See that? That's the proof for the sex."

Dean had tilted his head form side to side and then suddenly had widened his eyes, mouth forming a silent oh. "Huh, well. That little fella sure is packing."

"Yup. And see here," Sam had shuffled through the prints to another picture, "here's the baby sucking on his thumb, a sure sign of a fetal development of at least six months. The sucking reflex develops then, if I recall correctly."

"Samclopedia," Dean had fake coughed into his raised fist and Sam had kicked his leg underneath the table, while calmly smiling at John.

"So, Dad," Dean had asked while rubbing his leg, "what's up with those?"

John had sat up straighter in his chair before speaking up, "Between the two of you, who do you think could successfully handle performing a Caesarean section?"

There'd been half a second of silence, then Sam's answer, "Dean," and Dean's answer, "Wowowoh, what?" had come simultaneously.

John had looked at Sam, Sam had raised his big hands to give reason for his disqualification and shrugged and alright; that made sense. Sam had added, "Dean's really precise with needle and suture, too," over Dean's repeated, "What? What? Who!" and his, "Stop a second!"

Sam had asked, "Is this kid demonic? Does the mother know?" but John had shut him up with a glance and without an answer. He'd turned to his eldest, "Dean. Do you think you could do this?"

Dean had looked at him and he had been honestly freaked out, "Now? No way in hell, dad. No way. I'd kill the woman. If not the child as well. No, no way!"

John had grabbed his wrist, had kept his son at the table because of that, as Dean had seemed to want to flee the room.

"Not now. Dean, not now. Not today, not tomorrow. If you'd read about it, looked it up, if you knew what to do, could you do it?"

"Oh god, Dad. I could read about it for a month and I don't think I could do something like this just like that. Dad, don't ask this of me, please." Dean's eyes had been wide, the white of them had surrounded his irises completely.

John had shook Dean's wrist hard. "Boy, if you read up on it, practiced it. On animals, maybe. Could you do it?"

"I …fuck it. Damn you."

"Could you, Dean?" Insistent urging in his voice, demanding an answer.

"Damn you, yes. Yes, sir. I could."

Both his sons probably had then thought him a heartless bastard, a cowardly bastard certainly, for him to push this onto Dean and not do it himself. And, God, he would do it himself if there had been any way. But Sam and Dean could not have known, still could not understand, how much of a weight had lifted of John's heart at that moment.

He'd closed his eyes then, had let out the breath he hadn't known he'd held in as a sigh of relief and his grip on Dean's wrist had loosened. He still could recall the way Dean's hand had remained there on the table, still trapped inside John's fingers and how it had shaken. He couldn't blame the boy.

"Thank God. Thank God," He'd said then and had buried his face in his palms. Moments had passed silently. 

"Dad?" Sam's unsure address had been sudden and loud in the room when it had finally been spoken. John had rubbed at his eyes and had dragged his hands down his face hard. 

"This is your brother."

The glossy prints had made a small squeaking sound as they'd glided out of Sam's slack fingers.

Sam'd laughed one bark of unbelief.

"You have three months at the most to learn how to cut him out of me, son," John had said and Dean - Dean who had teased him about his gut the last week - had gotten ghostly white, his eyes had showed his true terror and he had fainted.

+++

The next weeks were tense, to say the least. John knew that Sam and Dean both researched for possible reasons, for an answer to his pregnancy. At the same time they tried to act comfortable around him.

Around him and around his undeniably big stomach.

They did not succeed in any way. John, on the one hand, found it hilarious, on the other hand, got annoyed at their antics real soon. He did not put a stop on it. He would have if he had not seen Dean additionally reading up on the operation's procedure. 

Dean was his best bet on survival.

+++

This morning John had needed help to get out of bed. This whole situation was getting ridiculous fast. He felt like a big fleshy bag of lard. The baby's kicks that had now wandered from hitting him in the bladder to hitting him in the stomach and lungs did not help.

John sat down at the kitchen table. He'd love to put his head on the table top. Today seemed to become one more day filled with a thousand things that drained every bit of energy out of him. Even simply sitting on the hard wooden chairs in his own kitchen seemed to tire him out today. He clumsily rubbed his back, pressed his fists against his spine. 

John felt old. 

He nursed the cup of tea, cold now, that was a left-over of breakfast. He picked at the shredded remains of Sam's croissant, ate niblets of it. The pains in his back made him nauseaous, nothing seemed to whet his appetite today.

John stood up. He felt dizzy and black spots clouded his vision. John lost his consciousness. He fell.

Luckily, he swept the cup off the table during his crash to the floor, attracting Dean's attention.

+++

When John next opened his eyes, everything was over.

The baby was born, he was cut open and sewn back together; no longer pregnant. Dean had succeeded in the operation's execution and John was still alive. As was his boys' new baby brother.

Dean fussed around him the moment he woke up. Apparently he'd slept longer then they would have liked him to. He felt like shit, groggy from drugs and blood loss.

Sam was in the room. John, taking in the time on the clock over at the wall, knew that Sam should be at school right now.

Sam sat in the armchair in the corner and had his baby brother in one of his big hands, feeding his new brother a bottle with the other. The baby looked impossibly tiny in Sam's hands, dwarfed further by the sheer presence of his big brother. Sam, in turn, looked impossibly smitten with the baby.

Before John got to actually see and hold his youngest, Sam and Dean both first checked the wound, redressed it tightly and carefully got him settled securely half-way on his side on the bed that now stood in the middle of the room for accessibility. 

He hurt. He had not thought that it would hurt that much. John had been clawed and cut before, but apparently never as deep. It would take a long time for him to be in top form again. Hell, it would take a long time for him to sit upright comfortably.

It may be cliché, but when he held the tiny, warm bundle that was his son John could not help himself but inspect everything on the infant. Count the toes and fingers, teeny as they were, smell the heavenly smell of clean baby. John fell asleep again, his son up next to his face, cradled by his hand and the pillows Sam placed around his brother.

+++

Dean and Sam had to wait for four days till they finally got to know their brother's name. At first John was too much out of it to be bothered, then he was wavering between three possibilities.

In the end the baby's name was chosen by Sam. John had told them of his ideas - Yuri, Victor and Andrew – and Sam had immediately picked Victor discarding the others as unsuitable for the new Winchester.

Victor, apparently either satisfied with his name or totally not bother by it at all, felt it was time for some more attention paid to him and promptly let his family know that changing his diaper right now was the best course of action for the immediate future.

Sam got to do it.

+++

They remained in town until Sam graduated from high school, then, as Sam got a full ride at the University of Stanford, the whole family moved to Palo Alto, CA.

Just that one long trip made it finally clear to John that the days of fetching his kids, putting them in his car and driving to the new job were over. Little Victor was very vocal is need be and to Dean's utter horror the baby did not like driving in the cars at all. Neither John's jeep, nor Dean's beloved Chevy. The only thing that got Victor calmed down marginally was Sam. Rather, Sam's chest. The toddler only calmed down when Sam had placed him lying down on his chest after Sam had folded himself and his long legs in the back seat of the Impala. Victor only slept when Sam sang along to whatever music Dean would play, the rumbling noises putting him to sleep.

They rented a house in Palo Alto after a week spent in a motel searching for the right one. It was a white town house, bigger than their usual places. Four rooms plus kitchen and baths and a fairly sized living room. They even had a garden.

John, Sam and Dean each moved into one room, the fourth one, the smallest out to the garden, was put down as a office. An office for Sam to work in, but mostly as a miniature headquarters for their hunting business. No one even dared to think about it being equipped and decorated as a nursery, even now with Victor being close to a year already.

Rather, when buying furniture - chairs, tables, beds, a couch, bathroom cabinets and desks – they got three plain but sturdy wooden bassinets, one for each bedroom. To further ensure that Victor was safe at home after assembling them, John and Dean decorated them liberally with protective carvings. 

Dean got a small job working at the nearest kindergarten. At first he mainly cleaned and cooked, but sometimes he got to care for the kids as well, whenever there was need for another pair of hands. Soon the director of the kindergarten recognized his unique talent of handling the worst of the troublemakers and spoilt brats and offered him a pay raise and an employment on a permanent basis. Dean accepted, on the stipulation that he could bring in with him his little brother if need be.

While Sam at first mainly concentrated on his studies, of which there was a lot and them being more time-consuming then he'd assumed, after his third semester he got a job at university as a tutor, thus contributing a bit to their housekeeping allowance. He also contributed by introducing Jessica Moore to his family as his girlfriend, presenting little rascal Victor with the first person yet that got him obeying to the letter with but a smile.

John still hunted. He was closer to the demon that killed Mary now then he ever was before. He spent his days jobbing half-time, watching over the little one and reading up on demons, calling friends and friend's of friends on demonic omens and unnatural phenomena. Lately, John also researched prophetic dreams and extrasensory perceptions, Sam repeatedly dreaming of women dying like his mother did could not be a coincidental chance.

However, when it came down to it, John did no longer feel the deep-seated need to go and chase after the demon. Living with his family in one place, a safe place of their own, settled John Winchester down like nothing could before.

He was glad about it.

**EXTRA GAG DRABBLE, extra crack-y and filled to the brim with 100 words of extra speshul logical logic, yessir.**

There were some kids in costumes at John's motel room's door and when he opened they yodelled "Trick or treat!" at him, but he could not give them treats because he had no sweets. Which was foolish and sucky and the kids frowned and *magicked* him pregnant cause you need to have kids to understand the necessity of Halloween sweets. John yelled, "Oi!" at them, wanted to run after then but couldn't because of his large belly and the children said, "Sucker!" and "Man, how can the old douche not have sweets?" and "Yeah!" and "Seriously!" and "His own fault!".


End file.
